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My cherished neopatrons and I were discussing how corporate studios’ refusal to make products normal people like is black pilling the masses.
Cue the indie lament “There’s plenty of great new stuff out there. You just need to look for it!”
But maybe we’re looking at it wrong.
A handful of cartels used to control access to the audience. If you wanted to make a living in the arts, you had to play ball.
Then new tech wrested control from the gatekeepers and gave it to the artists.
Now neopatronage lets artists share control with customers.
But there’s trouble in paradise.
Indies still complain they don’t get any support from backers or influencers. They’re sure they could take down Tor, DC Comics or Disney with a fraction of corporate IPs’ funding and reach.
They may just be right.
But …
Notice the assumption implied by the premises.
Indie vidya wants to be the new AAA. Newpub wants to be oldpub. Yet the same advances that birthed indie make legacy models unworkable.
Here’s what I’m saying …
There’s no monolithic “Industry” anymore; neither is there a unified audience. That’s what’s killing the old paradigm. And we’ve known it for years.
We’ve passed peak pop star. Oldpub can’t make another Stephen King. Tom Cruise is the last A+ lister.
Is that black pilling? No. But what does it mean for us?
It means what I’ve been saying for a while now: Pro artists, authors, and musicians will live next door to lawyers and plumbers. Comfortable, not rich.
The paradigm changed – twice – but creators still expect old model results.
So what?
So, the old way was trying to get in front of as many eyeballs as possible to make the maximum number of people want to buy the art you (or your handlers) wanted to make.
That’s less feasible by the day. There’s no more Elvis money.
What there is subsists inside the new paradigm – the return of patronage. That means sharing control with your audience, remember?
And it means the script’s flipped. Now they come to you to commission art they want.
That’s not black pilling on sales and marketing efforts. It is suggesting that indie creators might want to rethink where and how they’re focusing those efforts.
Margrave and higher tier patrons get to see my new short “The Voyage of Egeria” take shape as I write it. The first draft drops this month, so don’t miss out.
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> So, the old way was trying to get in front of as many eyeballs as possible to make the maximum number of people want to buy the art you (or your handlers) wanted to make.
> That’s less feasible by the day. There’s no more Elvis money.
This is the normal state of things. Mega stars like Elvis were a historical aberration.
Thank you for the run down. I can see parts of it with the rise of REAM, Vella, Wattpad, Locals, Patreon, etc. And the push for direct sales from your own website. But it comes back to marketing. You can be amazing at your art/writing/music, etc, making all the things that people "want" to see...but if you can't get eyes on it, there will be no word of mouth, there will be no sales. And I think that is frustrating for the "masses" too, because they can't find the thing that they want (like cable with 600 stations!), so they go back to what's easy (corporate studios), even if they don't really like it, because it "appears" that there is nothing else.